This was luxurious food for one accustomed to an oatmeal diet and Glory heartily enjoyed it, although she wished she could have given it to her grandfather instead, but she wasn’t one to borrow trouble and relied upon Meg’s word that a similar repast should be forthcoming when the seaman required it. She did not know that the very odor of the food set the washerwoman’s own mouth to watering and that she had to swallow fast and often, to convince herself that her own breakfast of warmed-over coffee and second-hand rolls was wholly sufficient. In any case, both she and Posy Jane had delighted in their self-sacrifice for the little “Queen of the Lane,” in their hearts believing that the child was now orphaned, indeed.
It is amazing how, when one is extremely hungry, even two whole potatoes will disappear, and very speedily Glory found that the cracked plate from which she had eaten was entirely empty, but, also, that the uncomfortable hunger had disappeared with its vanished contents. She sprang up, ran to the spigot, washed and wiped the plate, and restored it to its place on Meg’s scanty cupboard, then announced:
“I shall tell my grandpa how good all you dear, dear folks has been to me while he–he was off a-visitin’. An’ he’ll do somethin’ nice for you, too, he will. My grandfather says ‘giff-gaff makes good friends,’ an’ ‘one kind turn ’serves another.’ He knows a lot, grandpa does; an’ me an’ him both thanks you, Meg-Laundress–you darlin’!”
Away around the big neck of the woman at the tub went Glory’s slender arms, and when the patient toiler released herself from this inconvenient embrace, there was something besides soapsuds glistening on her hot cheek.
“Bless ye an’ save ye, honey sweetness, an’ may yer guardian angel keep ye in close sight, the hull endurin’ time!” cried the laundress, wiping her eyes with a wet towel to disguise that other moisture which had gathered in them. “An’ now, be off with ye to the little Eyetalian with the high-soundin’ name. Sure, ’twas Nick, the parson, hisself, what seen them fifty-five centses was in the right hands, an’ not scattered by that power o’ young ones as was hangin’ round when the lady give ’em.”
“Did he take them? Oh, I’m so glad an’ it’s queer he should ha’ forgot to tell me last night. Never mind, though. I ain’t goin’ to peddle to-day. I shan’t peddle no more till I find grandpa. I couldn’t. I couldn’t holler even, worth listenin’. An’ who’d buy off a girl what can’t holler?”
“Hmm. I don’ know. Hollerin’s the life o’ your trade, same’s rub-a-dub-dubbin’ ’s the life o’ mine, er puttin’ the freshest flower to the front the bunch is o’ Jane’s. But, land, ‘Queenie,’ you best not wait fer the cap’n. Best keep a doin’, an’ onct you’re at it again, the holler’ll come all right. Like myself–jest let me stan’ up afore this here tub an’ the wash begins to do itself, unbeknownst like. Don’t you idle. Keep peddlin’ er patchin’, though peddlin’s the least lonesome, an’ the time’ll fly like lightnin’. It’s them ’at don’t do nothin’ ’at don’t know what to do. Ain’t many them sort in the Lane, though, thank the dear Lord. Hey? What?”
For Glory still lingered in the doorway and her face showed that she had no intention of following the laundress’s most sensible advice. So when that loquacious woman paused so long that the little girl “could get a word in edgewise,” she firmly stated:
“No Meg, dear Meg, I shan’t peddle a single goober till I’ve found my grandpa. Every minute of every hour I’m awake I shall keep a-lookin’. He hain’t got nobody but me left an’ I hain’t got nobody but him. What belongs, I mean. ’Course, they’s all you dear Lane folks an’ I love you, every one. But me an’ him–I–I must, must find him. I’m goin’ to start right away now, an’–thank you, thank you an’ dear Posy Jane–an’–good-bye!”
This time it was Meg who caught the other in her arms and under pretense of smoothing tumbled curls, hugged the child in motherly yearning over her; then she gave her a very clean-smelling, sudsy kiss and pushed her toward the door, crying rather huskily: